Blog posts from June 2010

ALA’s sprawling conference leaves librarians dashing between hotels and meeting rooms, but I mostly stayed in one place--the ALA Publishing booth. I let the conference come to me. My colleagues and I were there to tell people about the RDA Toolkit, Guide to Reference and of course, ALA TechSource.

ALA Editions editors used a small table for meetings with authors. The RDA Toolkit had launched only a few days before the conference, and visitors came in a steady flow. Most were familiar with RDA and had a few specific questions about functions. On the last day, folks came to gawk at the heft of the print version. Not to brag, but I’m familiar enough with any of those products to give a serviceable demo. While working on the RDA project and its RDA Vocabularies component, I learned about the NSDL Registry managed by Diane Hillmann and Jon Phipps. Karen Coyle consulted on the project and has written a two-issue series of Library Technology Reportsexplaining the semantic web and how the RDA Vocabularies might be deployed with its technologies (by the way,you can get that two-issue set at 50% off at the ALA Store).
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We want to offer our sincere thanks to everyone who attended yesterday's ALA TechSource Gadget Petting Zoo! The event was a major success, with dozens of people coming by the ALA Publishing booth to talk with some of our bloggers about the latest gadgets and what they can do for our libraries.

It's hard to say which gadget got the most attention. Of course we were expecting a ton of interest in the iPad and eReaders, and the interest was certainly there. But there was so much activity and discussion going on at the booth that it would be unfair to say that those devices dominated the conversation. Read More »

At the ALA Annual Conference, it seems like there's always more to do and see than you can possibly fit into your schedule. No matter how many exhibits you see, how many presentations you attend and how many interesting people you meet, there's always something that you feel like you missed.
When it comes to technology at the conference, ALA TechSource has you covered. We're happy to announce that once again, we're hosting a Webinar featuring an expert panel who'll provide a look back at ALA Annual Conference from a library technology perspective. Our panel will analyze and discuss what they learned and what trends stood out at the conference.

This Webinar will take place Tuesday, July 13th at 2:30 Eastern/1:30 Central/ 11:30 Pacific. Read More »

If you're headed to the ALA Annual Conference in Washington D.C. this year, we hope you'll join us on the exhibition floor at the ALA Publishing Booth for the ALA TechSource Electronic Gadget Petting Zoo! This unique event will take place on Sunday, June 27 from 11:00am–12:30pm at Booth #2605. Read More »

Reader participation in a blog is like a community's engagement with a public library--it's impossible to have too much involvement. The ALA TechSource blog is a place for perspectives, opinions, news and discussion of library technology trends. While the first three are obviously important, librarianship is a profession where collaboration is essential, and without discussion, its impossible for librarians to take full advantage of the new technology that is transforming our profession. We want our readers to be more than readers. We hold your comments in the highest regard, and we're always looking for more perspective, insight and criticism from those who enjoy the material on this blog. Read More »

The 2010 Electronic Entertainment Expo, better known simply as E3, took place this past week. E3 2010 is the largest video game conference and press event in the US, and is the stage from which nearly all revolutionary new products and games are announced. So what was the major announcement this year that libraries and librarians should be aware of? Read More »

I was aware of him because at VALA2010 in February, he tweeted about the presentation Warren Cheetham and I gave covering our research project. He even retweeted one of my own tweets about the talk. I immediately followed him, subscribed to his blog and looked back at some of his writing and presentations. We became friends on Facebook. I was impressed with his synthesis of the possible roles for libraries, museums and cultural institutions in the social network landscape - with a strong emphasis on the people part of the equation.
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When personal computers first hit the mainstream, they presented an interesting opportunity for libraries. All of the sudden, it was possible to easily separate the content from the content-bearing device. Unlike printed books, microfilm, LP records, and other content-bearing devices, with computers it is easy to move content onto and off of the device. A few earlier devices, such as the wax tablet and stylus, along with the Etch-a-Sketch, had pointed the way to the future, but the computer really made it take off. Now libraries had the opportunity to get out of the device business. Just as hockey has been described as a good fight marred by skating, libraries may have been good information services marred by the need to shelve (and reshelve) content-bearing devices. Read More »

Marshall Breeding will be hosting the first of our ALA TechSource Online Workshops, Making the Right Choice: Software Purchases for Your Library’s Needs. The event will take place on Tuesday July 20th at 1:30pm Central/2:30pm Eastern/11:30am Pacific.
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Currently, the management and presentation of digital library collections revolve mostly around the digital library systems that house them. A librarian decides what digital resources go together and then works within the capabilities of the system to present the resources in an appropriate and orderly context. The result is typically a series of webpages that human beings need to navigate to find and click on the links to the resources that meet their information needs. While the system may expose its metadata for harvesting or its index for federated searching, the digital resources themselves are tucked deeply inside proprietary silos. Read More »

I use Flickr all the time personally, and my library has two accounts, a general library account and a University Archives account. Flickr has been around for a few years now, and librarians all over the world use it to share images from their personal and professional lives. Flickr is more than a great place to post and share photos with your community; it's a community in itself, and a starting place for all sorts of activities. Read More »